``Because it is the Right Thing to Do'': Taking Stock of the Peer Reviewers’ Openness Initiative

In recent years, multiple initiatives have sought to improve the transparency and reproducibility of psychological research. One example is the Peer Reviewers’ Openness Initiative (PRO), which aims to promote the sharing of data and code. PRO signatories pledge to provide a full review only for manuscripts that publicly share data and code, or include a justification why sharing is not possible. The punitive element of this approach attracted criticism: PRO may be perceived as coercive and could lead to negative repercussions for its signatories. Therefore we conducted a survey to assess signatories’ experiences with PRO. Contrary to the criticism, the reported experiences were predominantly positive, and 92% (117/127) of the signatories who completed the survey indicated that they would sign the initiative again today. Only 19 out of 127 respondents (15%) experienced negative reactions related to their commitment to PRO. Almost 50 respondents suggested ways in which PRO could be improved. We conclude that, from the signatories’ perspective, the benefits of the PRO initiative outweigh its drawbacks.